Talib Kweli Quotes

What else is stop and frisk? These neighborhoods are unsafe not because there's not enough cops illegally frisking people. They're not safe because of economic conditions. They're not safe because of all types of things in the government that people like Mike Bloomberg and Ray Kelly should be looking to fix instead of randomly searching kids in the hood. If you go to a college campus and you do stop and frisk, you're going to find a lot of drugs there, too.

The way I see it, if people truly love my music, they will support me in some way down the road.

They ask me what I'm writing for - I'm writing to show you what we're fighting for.

The responsibility of an artist is to be honest with themselves.

Or is it the mind state that's ill, creating crime rates to fill the new prisons the build

I have a luxury of people coming to see me whether I play for the crowd or not. I don't take that lightly.

"Art Imitates life," of course, is that phrase by Oscar Wilde. I called that song "Art Imitates Life" because Oh No was in the studio and he actually came up with that hook. When I was trying to figure out a name for the record, it just kind of made sense.

There just needs to be a gay rapper who's better than everybody. That's when that question will no longer be able to be asked.

I see that happening with hip hop purists now. Where you have an artist like a Kendrick [Lamar] or a Drake, who are really trying different things emotionally, different things musically, and on a mainstream level. And you have underground hip hop fans dissing it, for the simple fact that it's mainstream - not because what they're doing is whack, or what they're doing is not sincere.

You gotta eat right, you gotta have healthy habits, you know, and balance out your decadence with a healthy lifestyle during the day.

I don’t think that early hip hop stood out to be a social critique. A lot of fans of mine think that hip hop’s ultimate responsibility is to critique social structures.

We get high on all types of drugs when, all you really need is Love

When you shine bright, some won't enjoy the shadow you cast.

If you go to a college campus and you do stop and frisk, you're going to find a lot of drugs there too.

I think hip hop is a dance music that's rebellious by nature.

But you have to be creative on how you sell yourself and market yourself.

You have to know when to be arrogant. You have to when to be humble. You have to know when to be hard and you have to know when to be soft.

With Prisoner of Conscience, the focus was - I've worked with Madlib, High Tech, Kanye West, J Dilla. I feel like I've worked with some of the greatest of all time. That's been overlooked. That's been overshadowed by the weight of the lyrics.

I have such respect for the art of deejaying. I hesitate to even call myself a deejay.

Do the math: You never settle for less than the whole if you knew the half.

My kids are the most inspiring thing that pushes me. It used to be because they were born, and I had to take care of them. Now it's because my son raps, and he's better than me. So now I gotta keep up with him, you know what I'm saying?

I just got a new manager. He's like, "So what do you want to do with the deejay thing?" I'm like, "The deejay thing for me is more my hobby." It's great when you can supplement your income, when you have a weekly or something, it's fun. It's really a hobby, because I don't want it to take away from what I do, which is emceeing.

I like collaboration because, first of all, I'm good at writing lyrics. I don't know how to make beats. I don't play instruments. I'm not a good singer. So even when you see a solo album of mine, it's still a collaboration.

As far as my New York influence, one thing I'm proud of in my career is, I rep Brooklyn, New York all day. But people don't look at my music as New York music. People consider my music underground music.

I'm at a loss for words. But even my loss is amplified.

God gave us music, so we play with our words.

It’s very seductive to focus on what you don’t like as opposed to celebrating all that it is that you do.

Harry Belafonte hit me to the Dream Defenders and I liked what they were about. When I asked them how I could help their movement, they said, "You can help by coming down here; you can tweet."

A true artist does not depend on radio for success. A true fan does not let radio determine what they support

I feel like your city - with hip hop in particular, because we're always beating our chest and shouting where we're from - your city is just as influential as your parents. Even the grimy, hardcore gangster rap from New York - KRS-One and Wu Tang, the stuff acknowledges it.

You make knowledge relevant to life and you make it important for children to learn things that will really relate to things going on in their lives, and not abstract.

So I just had to step up how I was doing it and the moment that I stepped up and the moment I focused all my energy on that is when things started to happen. So there's a direct relationship between my inspiration and my output.

I don't feel comfortable making empty music.

Let me finish my music, and let me present it the way I want to present it. And then share it, put it online, do whatever you want to do after that.

The problem with our role is Americans live in a world of illusion.

I support the idea that artists have to make a stand. I'm with that - you're putting the discussion on the table and you're letting people know. You're being brave as an artist and responsible to the community.

To be honest, that whole exchange with Crunk Feminist actually made me write the song because I realize there's a lot of young women out there so hurt by the misogynistic images in hip-hop they paint it with such a broad brush stroke that they think anybody that defends hip-hop is defending misogyny.

Young kids should be doing music that has shock value. They'll grow out of it.

Being called a conscious rapper is quite a compliment. It's a great thing to be. But as an artist, my nature is to not be in a box.

Even an independent label is looking for a hit, they're not looking for a record that's not gonna do well.

I think music sharing of any kind is great.

The only way for me to be an artist is to be honest in my craft. If I veer from that, I'm not giving the investors what they want. Sometimes it's my job as an artist to know what I want to do, even when the fans tell me different.

I was kind of just too lazy to take my money out of the bank until I saw how Citi Bank responded to Occupy Wall Street.

I think once you're in the public eye, whether you're a boss, a teacher or whatever you do, that you're automatically in the position of role model. You have people looking up to you, so whether you choose to accept it or not is a different question.

If you look at my career, doing albums with Norah Jones, Justin Timberlake, Gucci Mane and Lil Wayne or KRS-One and Jean Grae, I can't be pigeonholed.

I think people are into me because of my music choices and my musicality.

But it becomes disrespectful when the artist's process is not respected.

Fortunately, artists can live off their works, if you're creative at how you do it. If you just depend on the videos and the radio, you're at a loss.